


The Heavens Blaze Forth

by newmrsdewinter



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Death, Discussion about the afterlife, F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Golden Deer Route, Ghosts, Heavy Angst, Not quite canon typical gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:21:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23046184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newmrsdewinter/pseuds/newmrsdewinter
Summary: After his death at Gronder Field, Dimitri's ghost follows Marianne every step of the way to Enbarr.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Marianne von Edmund
Comments: 22
Kudos: 80
Collections: Those Who Drabble in the Dark





	The Heavens Blaze Forth

**Author's Note:**

> another drabble prompt! This week, it was "underworlds." I'm inexcusably late and inexcusably past the word limit. Sorry y'all! 
> 
> Even if it isn't canon compliant to VW, please assume that Marianne and Dimitri have already reached their A-support.

Marianne wipes the vomit from her lips and takes one shuddering breath before rising from her knees. Her knees buckle when her throat constricts again, but she has the sense not to trip over her skirts when the next wave of nausea sends her sprawling back on the grass. She wipes her lips again and uses her staff to hoist herself back to her feet. This time, she is determined not to fall. 

All the countless hours leading up to this moment failed to prepare her for the bloodbath at Gronder field. Friend turned against friend. Wild flames that consume the ballista in the center of the battlefield, where the shrieks of someone familiar ring through her mind as clearly as bells. 

In her stupor, her thoughts are thrust back to an oil painting that used to hang in her father’s home, one that petrified her with fear as a child and fascinated her as an adult. Angels and demons fighting against a backdrop of fire and brimstone, trampling and swarming in a seething crush of bodies. This is the hellfire she feared as a child; with every hammering pulse of her heart, she hears the war drums beating the tune that would send the innocent to the eternal flames. 

_I don’t know the difference_ , Marianne thinks to her own horror, gazing up to see a barrage flames raining upon the Kingdom line, sending soldiers into chaos. _I can’t see the difference anymore_. 

A soft but urgent voice calls out to her from behind the tent, breaking her reverie. She whirls around, startled. Claude dismounts his wyvern, looking windblown. His jaw is tight, but his eyes are glassy. 

“Marianne, you must come quickly.” 

“J-Just a moment,” she protests, unable to stop the tremor in her voice. “I need a moment, please.” 

A pained expression crosses his face. “I…I’m sorry, but this can’t wait.” 

Reluctantly, she follows him back into the tent, and horror worse than an omen washes over her. Frantically, she shoves Claude aside, presses past the rows of wounded soldiers, and rushes forward until she reaches a cloth partition. 

The cloth flutters, and Hilda raises her ashen face the instant Marianne steps inside. 

“Marianne,” she calls, and her voice cracks. “I — I couldn’t —” 

Hot tears slide down Marianne’s cheeks. She shakes off Claude’s arm, presses a hand to her mouth, and chokes back a hideous sob. 

Lying motionless upon a bedroll soaked through with scarlet, Dimitri looks so much smaller without the relic towering over his head, without the dark mantle shrouding his cloak, and without the massive plate armor that failed to protect him when he needed it most. His countenance is so peaceful that he might have been sleeping, if not for the arrow shafts and broken lance tips studding his torso and neck. 

“His last words,” Hilda whispers. “He — he asked for you —” 

Marianne touches Dimitri’s cold cheek and lets herself believe it. 

* * *

His ghost haunts her with every step the Alliance army takes towards Enbarr. 

The first time she sees him, her entire body freezes as though someone had just run her through with a knife. Dimitri prowls between the smoking funeral pyres that burn after the battle at Fort Merceus. Even though his spectre takes form through shadow and smoke, she hears the scrape of his gauntlet as he drags his hand along the gore-spattered walls of the fortress. 

When Dimitri turns in her direction, gaunt-eyed and with sorrow in the set of his features, she stares back at him, and knows that he can see her too. 

After that, solitary vigils become a regular occurrence in the monastery cathedral. He broods under the fragmented reflection of a stained-glass window, where his outline is barely visible in the sunlight. His blank gaze is fixed upon the dead lying in rows, waiting for burial. 

Not once does she ever approach him, but nor does she have reason to fear him. A ghost is nothing more than a shade attached to a particular place or regret. His spectre is drawn to death; remorse is the tether that ties him to the earth, clinging to him like a stench fouler than decay. 

Marianne sees Dimitri one final time among the living after Enbarr. He kneels before Edelgard’s remains with deliberate slowness, then closes the lids of her unseeing eyes. When Marianne blinks, he has already vanished, scattered in the dust motes swirling in the light of the empty throne room. 

* * *

In her dreams, they are together under the stars, alone on the rolling lawn of the Officers Academy. 

The night sky is filled with birds gliding below the clouds, crying a dirge so lost and mournful that it raises the gooseflesh on her arms. She’s dreamed this dream so many times since the end of war that every detail feels like a long-lost memory, one that she’s locked away in the back of her mind, only to resurface when she's asleep. 

It’s only here that she remembers Dimitri as she had loved him in life: his crooked half-smile, that shy hesitancy when he envelops her into his strong arms and tucks her head beneath his chin. Gone is the tension in his shoulders, the anger and the sorrow. If anything, he seems happy to be back in the monastery, the one place where he found joy in his youth.

“Don’t move,” she pleads. Her voice is muffled by the front of his shirt. “Stay with me, please.” 

“You’ve been so brave,” Dimitri murmurs. His lips ghost over the crown of her head. “After all these years, you still think of me fondly even though it devastated you, seeing me like that.” 

“When I’m awake, I can’t remember your face.” Her confession comes out in a whisper so shameful she can hardly find it within herself to continue. “Not even your voice. I always knew that memories fade with time, but I never thought…” 

“The ones who love you never truly leave you,” he says sadly. “I knew that when I was alive. I knew it, but I couldn’t remember…I wish....” 

Her hand rises to cup the curve of his cheek with her palm. “Dimitri…” 

“I can hear them calling my name,” he admits sorrowfully, looking past her to the night sky shimmering with stars. “But I can’t join them. Not yet.” 

“But if it brings you peace…” 

His lips pull into a smile so melancholy that her stomach lurches. He covers her trembling hand with his own, stroking his thumb over her wrist. “Please don’t tell me to leave, Marianne. Not just yet.” 

“Dimitri, I _don’t_ want you to go!” she cries. So startled by her own outburst, she grips him tighter, frightened he’ll vanish in the mist. “Don’t leave, please don’t leave —” 

“Starting now, we’ll never be apart. Not now, and not ever.” 

“Do you promise?” 

“Of course.” 

His promise is a kiss that he brushes over her lips, soft and gentle. She feels his sudden intake of breath when she lifts herself on her tiptoes to wrap her arms around his neck and deepen the embrace. His warmth is so real that it burns, and it aches worse than the hollowness that follows when they finally part, gasping for breath. Their eyes linger upon each other’s faces, spellbound by this fragile, delicate moment. 

Marianne’s pulse thumps madly in her chest, like a songbird fluttering its wings in the cage of her heart. 

“Don’t look back,” she whispers, and releases his hand. 

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote most of this on March 5th, so kudos if you find the persona 3 reference 🚪


End file.
